The HP Pavilion dm4-1173cl ($799.99 list at Costco) has a light structure coupled with a unique, laser-etched metallic design. This 14-inch mainstream laptop, available at Costco, has the features and performance numbers to back up its cool look. The only thing that holds the dm-1173cl back is its finicky touch pad and some added bloatware, which also held the dm4-1160us ($850 street, 4 stars) back.

Design
The dm-1173cl follows the lead of trendsetters like Apple by sporting a metallic outer casing. HP complements this look by adding a laser-etched design on the exterior and palm-rest portion of the laptop. The full-size keyboard is in the chiclet style, each key being perfect, isolated squares. The typing experience was responsive and enjoyable, but was dampened by the finicky touchpad. It's an all-in-one multitouch clickpad, like the one on the MacBook Pro ($1,199 direct, 4 stars) and dm4-1160us. However, the mouse would jump occasionally when I used two fingers for navigation. A work around for this problem is using the one finger touch-click method or download the driver update that will mute some of the issues.

The dm4-1173cl comes with a 14-inch widescreen, which is one size bigger than the 13-inch ones found on the Asus U30Jc-A1 ($899 street, 4.5 stars). The extra inch of screen real estate can make all the difference when juggling spreadsheets, media, and Web surfing. The standard resolution is 1,366 by 768, which is common among 14-inch laptops, like the HP dm4-1160us and Asus U45Jc-A1 ($867 street, 4.5 stars). If you're looking to bump up your resolution to, say, 1600 by 900 you'll have to look at some more high-end (and more expensive) laptops like the HP Envy 14 ($1,286 direct, 4 stars) or Sony VAIO VPC-Z116GXS ($1,800 direct, 4 stars). For a 14-inch laptop, the dm4-1173cl was one of the lightest, weighing in at 4.3 pounds. It was lighter than the HP dm4-1160us (4.4 pounds) and Asus U45Jc-A1 (4.7 pounds).

Features
The dm4-1173cl's feature set includes all the standard connectivity ports: Two USB 2.0 ports, a combo eSATA/USB port, HDMI, VGA, 5-in-1 media card reader, and a headphone and mic jack. It also has a dual-layer DVD burner, Webcam, and fingerprint reader, in case regular password protection just doesn't cut it. The 500GB hard drive spins at 7,200rpm, which is faster than the 500GB 5,400rpm hard drive on the U45Jc-A1.

What would a system be without bloatware? Probably from a boutique dealer. However, the HP dm4-1173cl is not without. I found, upon start up, HP's own dock that contains a Norton anti-virus trial, a shortcut to HP's download store, and drop-down links to Hulu and Netflix. The desktop also contained shortcut buttons to eBay (as if I couldn't find it myself) and HP games brought to you by WildTangent. Personally, I can do without such added software, I would prefer if HP just kept the shortcut to their download store and be done with it, allowing users to decide whether or not they want this software taking up space.

Since this is a Costco system, the large retailer adds a 2-year warranty with Costco's Concierge Services, a free service to customers who buy their electronic products. This added benefit provides consumers with tech support to help with setup or troubleshooting their system.

Performance
The dm-1173cl comes with a 2.4GHz Intel Core i5 processor with Intel's integrated HD graphics and 4GB of DDR3 memory. It has, essentially, the same specs as the HP dm4-1160us, and though it didn't beat the latter on almost all our tests, its scores were close. The dm-1173cl scored a total of 5,889 on our PCMark Vantage test, eking out a better score than the MacBook Pro (4,121) and Asus U45Jc-A1 (5,361). Its Core i5 processor makes the dm4-1173cl a contender in the multimedia area. It scored 2 minutes 55 seconds on our Handbrake test and 5:06 on Photoshop CS5, beating out the Asus U45Jc-A1 (Handbrake 3:02; CS5 5:46). However, its integrated graphics chipset holds it back from any kind of 3D prowess, shown by its 1,955 score on 3DMark06; and its score of 7 frames per second on our Lost Planet 2 DX9 gaming test is unplayable. Then again, this was never meant to be a gaming laptop.

The dm-1173cl's 44WH battery did better than average on our MobileMark 2007 battery test, scoring 5 hours 48 minutes. It fared better than the HP dm-1160us (5:30) and MacBook Pro (5:05), but couldn't beat the Asus U45Jc-A1's whopping 9:27 with its 85WH battery.

The HP Pavilion dm4-1173cl is an extremely solid contender within the mainstream laptop space. Its overall appeal, however, was marred by a finicky touchpad and some unnecessary bloatware. Otherwise, its performance was smooth, design was pleasing, and features were standard. The battery life went above expectations, but the current Editors' Choice, the Asus U45Jc-A1 has this as well as switchable graphics technology by Optimus and almost 10 hours of battery life.